*State Representatives Darrin Camilleri, Adam Zemke, and Christine Greig introduced three bills on Thursday, April 26th to require schools in Michigan to have a school library staffed with a certified library media specialist as well as staff to keep the library open when the library media specialist is unavailable. See:(https://housedems.com/article/bills-require-library-every-michigan-public-sc... <https://housedems.com/article/bills-require-library-every-michigan-public-school>)MAME's advocacy committee has worked for several years to raise awareness of the critical need for effective school libraries and to have bills such as these introduced.Now, we need your help!The representatives want to raise awareness of the need for equitable access to school libraries staffed by certified school librarians to help them in their efforts to secure funding. Please send a letter/email to [or call] your Michigan House Representative asking them to support these three bills --- HB 5909, HB 5910, HB 5911.Here is a sample letter for you to personalize to send to your Michigan House Representative: http://bit.ly/slbillsamp <http://bit.ly/slbillsamp>. It's simple - just make a copy of this google document and modify and personalize this letter (or you may write your own).The letter includes the link to look up your House Representative's contact information; but, we will also include it here:http://house.michigan.gov/mhrpublic/frmFindaRep.aspx <http://house.michigan.gov/mhrpublic/frmFindaRep.aspx> If your representative is Darrin Camilleri, Adam Zemke, or Christine Greig or one of the additional bill supporters - Stephanie Chang, David LaGrand, Robert Wittenberg, Leslie Love, Pam Faris, Kristy Pagan, Vanessa Guerra; please send them a letter/email to thank them for their support of our students’ equitable access to effective school library programs staffed by certified school library media specialists.Thank you, in advance, for sending a letter to your Michigan legislator. We need to work together to raise awareness of our students’ need for effective school library programs in our state.If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us.Also, it would be helpful (but not necessary); if you do send a letter to your legislator, please send a quick reply to this email with your legislator's name and/or district. Feel free to pass this information onto colleagues, friends, family; we are trying to reach all legislators.We would love to flood our legislators with emails in support of these bills!Thank you!!Michigan Association for Media in Education (MAME)Advocacy CommitteeKathy Lester, ChairLisa BrakelCarrie BettsAmy HermonKlaudia JanekLisa KelleyGwenn MarchesanoShannon TorresCynthia Zervos* Kathy Lester, MLIS, MA *Advocacy Chair, Past-President 2014* Michigan Association for Media in Education (MAME) *SIGLIB Steering Committee* Michigan Association for Computer Users in Learning (MACUL) *School Library Media Specialist / Technology Coach* *SL21 Model Library, 2017-2018* *SL21 Exemplary Ranking - Michigan School Libraries for the 21st Century 2016-2019* East Middle School, Plymouth-Canton Schools *ISTE Making IT Happen Award Winner* *2017 MAME Michigan School Library Program of the Year* *2012 **State Librarian's Excellence Award Winner* kathyL@mimame.org twitter: @LibraryL <https://twitter.com/LibraryL> 810.333.5873